Chinese Super League club Guangzhou Evergrande's Asian Football Confederation Champions League victory over the weekend "attracted the largest TV audience for a sporting event in China this year, with an average audience totalling over 30 million watching" as coach Marcello Lippi's side edged out K League Classic FC Seoul, according to XINHUA. The match "drew an average audience of 23.68 million viewers on CCTV-5." In total, the 2013 AFC Champions League "has achieved a combined average rating of 280 million, with a combined reach of 1.37 billion." AFC General Secretary Dato' Alex Soosay said, "The final of the AFC Champions League is the pinnacle of club football in Asia and these record TV audience figures highlight the popularity of the competition and the desire for fans to watch in ever increasing numbers." With the game also reaching a total audience of 68.19 million on CCTV-5, "the total reach for the second leg of the final across all channels was nearly 120 million." Guangdong Satellite, meanwhile, "generated an average reach of 2.11 million, with a total reach of 36 million; while Guangdong Sports drew an average audience of 3.03 million with a total reach of close to 10 million" (XINHUA, 11/13).

Austrian free-to-air TV channel ATV "has agreed to a cooperation with pay-TV operator Sky to air the German Bundesliga top game live on free TV" on Nov. 23, according to Manuel Nunez Sanchez of QUOTENMETER. It will be the first time since '09-10 that ATV broadcasts a game from Germany's top flight. ATV "will use Sky's feed starting at 5:30pm Austrian time to show the pay-TV channel's pregame coverage." The game itself will start at 6:30pm. The cooperation between ATV and Sky "is, for now, a one-time thing." Sky Austria Managing Dir Kai Mitterlechner said that the network "hopes the cooperation will provide it with a marketing boost." He said, "The cooperation is an intelligent interlocking between pay TV and free TV. We expect important marketing impulses for our product through the national free-TV presence" (QUOTENMETER, 11/12).

BT Sport promoted "the wide range of sport on its channels through a new TV ad" starring presenter Jake Humphrey that launched on Tuesday, according to Maisie McCabe of CAMPAIGN LIVE. In the new spot, created by Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO, "Humphrey is freed from the BT Sport studio to visit people watching live coverage from the broadcaster." As the ad and Humphrey flip through front rooms, pubs, kitchens and a barber's, "the people in the various settings are so engrossed in the live action on BT Sport that they do not notice him." The ad "was written by Matt King, art directed by Larry Dyer and directed by Ben Wheatley through Moxie Pictures." Maxus "handled media planning and buying" (CAMPAIGN LIVE, 11/12).

The England and Wales Cricket Board has agreed to a broadcast deal for Australia’s next two Ashes tours of England with Australian broadcaster Channel Nine. The deal includes exclusive rights in Australia to the Ashes Series and the One-Day Series and Int'l T20 matches in '15 and '19. England’s other home int'l series are not included in the package, meaning the ECB can sell these rights to other Australian broadcasters. Nine holds the Australian domestic broadcast rights for the upcoming Ashes Series which begins in Brisbane on Nov. 21 (ECB). The Int'l Cricket Council announced that 16 matches from the group stages of the upcoming World Twenty20 Qualifier UAE 2013 will be live-streamed on the ICC's official website. The event commences in the UAE (ICC).

Spanish Football League (LFP) President Javier Tebas recently discussed his league's "war on corruption" and how La Liga and the Spanish second division compare to the Premier League in terms of TV revenue, according to MARCA. On the subject of Premier League clubs earning more revenue from TV contracts, Tebas said, "We hope that clubs in the Premier League that are comparable to Valladolid, Levante or Rayo Vallecano earn the same as our clubs, but that is impossible. In the EPL, they earn a total of €2.2 billion ($3B), and we are at €800 million ($1M). This is not due to good or bad management, because we should not forget that England has 35% more people than Spain, and three times as many pay-TV subscribers. There are 11 million pay-TV subscribers in England and 3 million in Spain." Tebas explained Spain's lack of pay-TV subscriptions by saying, "In Spain, the number of subscribers has fallen because of the crisis and a Spanish phenomenon that is not equal in any other part of the world: piracy. It seems that in Spain, it is foolish not to pirate. In fact, the U.S. ambassador is calling ministers every day criticizing them for not doing enough to fight against piracy" (MARCA, 11/13).